The Sound of the Mountain rehearses at The Cavern in Russellville. Group members said they haven't had much time to practice lately because they've been playing so many shows. (THE COURIER / Travis Simpson)

“Technically, I want to say our band name came from the movie ‘The Bucket List,’” Matt White said when asked to explain where his band’s unusual name, “The Sound of the Mountain,” came from.

“It came from the voice of God,” John Pounders, the band’s bassist, said. After the group had a laugh, Pounders clarified. “Because Morgan Freeman said it.”

Yet, the name fits, somehow. The instrumental post-rock group’s music is massive and sweeping, with long builds that pay off into satisfying leads.

While you won’t hear mind-bending guitar riffs or lightning-speed solos the group offers something many other bands lack: creativity and enthusiasm.

Guitarists Logan Shipley and Daniel Cox get the most possible out of each note and utilize a wide variety of effect pedals to bring both surprising and satisfying sounds out of their instruments.

The Sound of the Mountain recently won the Arkansas Times Musicians Showcase, beating out 20 other bands from across the state. The win comes with a handful of prizes, including recording time at Blue Chair Studio, a gift certificate to Jacksonville Guitar, a T-shirt package from Section 8, a photo shoot and spots playing at Riverfest, Valley of the Vapors, the Arkansas State Fair and the Arkansas Sounds music festival. The group also gets a party and a drink named after them at Stickyz in Little Rock.

“It’s pretty big for us,” Shipley said. “I felt pretty awesome about it but I’m most excited that it got us five big shows, if you include the victory party show at Stickyz.”

The group has been playing together for four years, and in that time they’ve had varying degrees of success. Despite never playing outside the United States some of that success has come from overseas.

“We would get playlists from radio stations over there [Europe] and they’d be playing us,” White said.

The group’s first album, “The Child of Stereo in Mono,” fell into the hands of the European label Stressed Sumo, which helped distribute it to radio stations overseas.

“They said they’d set us up with shows if we could get over there,” Pounders said. “We just haven’t had the money to go.”

Regardless of exposure, the group considers their involvement with Stressed Sumo as mostly public relations.

“We consider ourselves independent,” Shipley said. “And as far as signing with a local label, it would really depend on what they had to offer us. We don’t want to be on a label just to be on a label.”

While their music hasn’t taken them overseas as of yet, it has taken them plenty of places. Since their first show at the Godbey in Atkins near the end of November 2008, the band has played in Oklahoma, Missouri, Iowa, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, North Carolina, Virginia and Georgia and put out two albums: The aforementioned “The Child of Stereo in Mono” and “My Child I have the Answer.”

Both albums are packed with sweeping, soundtrack-esque songs that wordlessly invoke emotions from the listener. Shipley said he wanted more from his songs than just catchy tunes.

“I want it to have a feeling,” he said. “I really want that. I’ll play a riff 20 times to show them [The Sound of the Mountain].”

“He has to make us feel it, too,” Cox added.

The “feeling” is evident the moment you hear them play. It’s about more than cramming in as many notes as possible. It’s about more than showing off or looking cool.

It’s about the music — something strangely and inappropriately lacking from the music industry these days.